Save
by Tinkerpanda
Summary: Sam's staring down the barrel of his gun at a scared little girl.  He doesn't want to shoot but will to protect his team.  Episode-centric oneshot for Planets Align.


_AN: Hey! I watched Planets Align yesterday with my housie whom I blackmailed into watching FP with me. And I was struck by how incredibly fiercely concentrated Sam is while he's training the gun at the girl and how terrified Jules looks when she's losing control of the negotiation. It just inspired me and I jotted out a quite oneshot._

**...**

He desperately and completely did not want to shoot. He watched as the girl's eyes darted around the room, hysterically looking for any sign of Gerald – the man who'd abducted her. The only person she'd had any contact with for the past eight years. The centre of her universe. The man who'd made and destroyed her. Sam steadily kept his crosshairs trained on her small form.

Her dress had the same pattern as the quilt his mother kept in the family drawing room, the tiny roses daintly marching across the white muslin like tiny floral soldiers. He lain on the couch as a kid, so sick he couldn't lift his head, tracing the lines of flowers with his small hand. He remembered the way the fire danced over the crisp fabric and the way his sister's laugh carried through from the kitchen where his mother was making tea. It broke his heart a little.

She incoherently babbled lines from the book – he recognized them himself. He'd remembered the way they'd resonated with him as he'd crouched, hours on end, in the frigid cold of the Afghani desert nights. A mind truly could make a hell of heaven or a heaven of hell.

He tried not to let the memories or the girls words clog his judgement. He couldn't afford to be distracted. He needed to have a clear focus. Clear mind, clear heart, clear sight.

But still, he didn't want to shoot.

But that girl – that scared little girl who didn't look old enough to even know what the words Milton had penned meant – had her shotgun trained at Jules chest. Jules' was trying not to panic, he knew. She could throw herself off a 6 story telecommunications tower without a problem, he knew. He'd seen her tackle bad guys, shoot guns, run obstacles courses and stare down hardened drug dealers. She could rappel down any building and had assisted Spike's bomb diffusion without so much as a shake. But she was scared now.

Jules was terrified of failing – it read all over her face. Her eyes were dialated, her breathing rapid and shallow the vest rapidly rising and falling with each unsteady inhalation. She was scared to lose the girl. It always hurt to pull the trigger – to take the command and end a life. But when it was a girl, a scared, lost confused girl who'd be shut away from the world for almost a decade, ripped from her family's arms by a monster, it was somehow impossibly harder. Sam felt his finger slip on the trigger and gritting his teeth he adjusted the gun until it was flush against his shoulder again.

He had to protect her. Jules. That was his job. Her job was to reach the girl. His was to protect his teammate.

"He said he was coming back. It's not true is it? He isn't coming back is he?" The girl was escalating, rapidly losing her grip in a world that was crumbling around her like a sandcastle in a rising tide, grains falling away in chunks until nothing remains but the memory.

"Sir, she's got her gun on Jules." He relayed into the radio, struggling to keep his own quivering doubts from finding a foothold in his voice. He was pleased when his tone was rock steady, his words even and controlled. "I've got the solution."

"No. Please." Jules murmured to him, turning her head towards him so he could hear. It was the _please _that got him. He shifted, taking in a quick gulp of air and letting the gun rise and fall against his chest, still trained on the panicked young girl.

She was so very young.

He didn't want to do it. He didn't want to bury a bullet in her, didn't want to take that lethal shot and end her short and pitifully unfulfilled life. She'd never truly had a chance to live. He gritted through it. He told himself he could do it. He could make that choice if he needed. Team always came first.

He heard Jules speaking, tone excited, words rapidly tumbling out, growing faster and faster. Her hands were flying as she elaborated. He listened with half a ear, intently watching the girls' posture. Just a gentle squeeze and he'd lose a team member. He couldn't afford that. Tears were trembling on the girl's cheeks, her face contorted in anger and pain. Her arms were trembling with the effort to keep the gun aloft. It was lowering, centimetre by slow and shaky centimeter. But it wasn't enough. It wasn't enough yet. The girl was heaving with sobs, gasping in breaths.

"Outside? That great big world? It's even prettier than the one inside your room." He heard Jules tell the girl. And, despite the horrors – and he'd seen many – he knew it was. It was a beautiful world. And it was worth protecting.

"It's your choice." Jules told the girl. "Your choice."

Another wracking sob. Another gulp of air. And at last, she dropped the gun. It clattered as it fell against the floor. And Sam could breath again.

_Thank you Jules_. He thought as he could lower his weapon, the fierce look of determination and concentration wiped from his face by the wave of relief. He hadn't had to shoot a child today. He didn't have to add one more body to his count. He'd done what he'd come to the SRU to do. Save.

...

_AN: I'm suprirsed how little time that took- only 10 minutes! Jeez. The latest chapter of Vacant Sands took me three days! Anyway drop me a line and tell me what you think. I love to hear feedback so major luff to anyone who reviews._


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